“Whispers in the Dark”—Skillet
IT HAD BEEN ALMOST two days since I had tried to call Sera and she hadn’t answered. Since then, I had tried to call everyone I knew down there. No one answered. Not her dad, not her brother, not even my grandfather. I was going out of my fucking mind and cursing myself for not getting her friend Amy’s phone number. It was to the point that I was preparing to hop on a plane to head down there, when my phone rang.
Javier.
“Hey, man, what’s up? No one has been answering my calls. What the fuck is going on down there?” His rough exhale was my first clue something was seriously wrong. “Javier?”
“Kayde, you need to get your ass down here. Like now. I didn’t want to worry you, but you need to get down here. Fuck. Just… it’s… Jesus. Kayde, it’s Sera. It’s bad. He got her. I’m so fuckin’ sorry, man. I’m heading to the hospital now, but I don’t know if they’ll tell me anything. Please hurry.” Uncle Javier was a bad motherfucker, and I’d never heard him like this. Not even after Abuela. My blood ran cold as what he said sank in.
“I’m on my way.” Not even taking time to put my machine away, I left my room at the studio and rushed to the door.
“Roy, I need you to have Harper call my clients for the next few days. I’m sorry. I… I have to go. There’s an emergency back home. ¡Chingados! I’ll try to be back by the weekend.” My mind was zinging all over the place, and it was hard to concentrate. I fucking knew this was going to happen.
Inside my chest felt like a hollow, bottomless pit. Not wanting to deal with the questions from anyone, I silenced my phone and headed to the airport.
“Sir, you can’t go in there!”
“Fuck you! That’s my girl in there.” Sleep had escaped my greedy clutches on the flights, and my eyes matched the last flight I just had. By now, I knew I needed a shave, and I probably looked more than a little homeless. But damn, it had been a hell of a trip to get down here. Layovers, delayed flights, plane trouble, and now this motherfuckin’ cop trying to keep me from my woman.
He pulled a taser from his belt, pointing it at me. Raising an eyebrow at him, I dared him to shoot me. I couldn’t believe fucking Barney Fife here. “Jesus, did someone take away your pew-pew? You may knock me down, but I’ll take those damn wires and wrap them around your dick. Better decide quick. You gonna let me in, or are we gonna do this the hard way?”
“What the hell is…? Oh. You.” Sighing in resignation, Christian looked over his shoulder, back in the room. “It’s okay, Thompson. Unfortunately, I know him.” He looked as shitty as I felt.
“Well, fuck you very much, Christian. Let me in. Now.” My patience was wearing seriously thin, and I could feel my restraint unraveling.
Shaking his head, he looked at me with eyes dead with despair. “You really aren’t going to want to come in.” Despite his words, he stepped to the side to let me pass.
Turning first to flip off the uniform by the door, I entered into my own version of Hell. Nothing in the entire world could have prepared me for the sight that greeted me in that hospital bed, and I’ve seen a lot of shit. Just never with someone who meant so much to me.
Christian ran his hands through his hair. “She out like a light right now, thanks to the pain meds the nurse gave her earlier. They said she’ll probably sleep like the dead for several hours, until it starts to wear off.” His voice sounded as haggard as he looked.
My mouth opened three fucking times before I could get the words to collect and exit. “Sagrada Maria, madre de Dios, esto no puede estar pasando. Voy a matar a alguien. Por favor que sea esto un sueño terrible. Christian, what the fucking hell happened?” Before I even knew what I had done, Christian’s already wrinkled shirt was clutched in my fists, and I had him slammed against the wall. “How could you let this happen to her?” My voice was on the edge of being a shout.
“Goddamn it, Kayde, you think I would let this happen? Are you fucking serious right now? That sonofabitch had me tied up under accusations of being a dirty cop. I didn’t even know he might go after her. Thanks to him, every fucking person I knew was looking at me like I was a piece of shit, and I was trying to dig out from under it. I still am. You think you work side by side with people for years, you should know them and be able to vouch for their character, not have them torture your sister.” He gave a disgusted laugh. “He was also in the process of fucking with my dad’s paperwork to make it look like he was an illegal with falsified papers so he could deport him. Dad just left to go check on Marla. She’s torn up something fierce too.”
Slowly uncurling my fingers from the folds of his shirt, I stepped back. Fatigue hit me like a sledgehammer.
“How is she? Other than looking like… ¡Ay, Dios mio! And where’s Ty?” My eyes felt like they were on fire as I sat staring at the woman in the bed, afraid to touch her. Thanks to my dumb ass putting my phone on silent, or maybe during one of my flights, Sera had called and I missed it. The message she’d left me didn’t even begin to touch on how bad this shit was, just that she needed me here. Neither she nor my uncle had mentioned Ty either, and all I’d been able to do was worry. Now I wanted answers.
“Ty’s safe. He’s at Marla’s.” His gaze fell on his sister. Swallowing hard, my old friend looked broken, and tears filled his eyes. “They said it looks worse than it is, surprisingly. Both shoulders were dislocated. She’s bruised and… damaged, but nothing is broken, and they don’t believe there is any further significant internal bleeding.” Dropping into the chair pulled close to the bed, he buried his face in his hands. The words he’d spoken settled over my tired brain, and dread began to weave its way up until it was choking me.
“Damaged?” Covering my mouth, my teeth were grinding and my jaw clenched. “What the hell does that mean, Christian?” Don’t say it. Please, don’t say it. Don’t say what I think you’re going to say.
“Kayde….” It was the barest whisper.
“No.”
“He—” Silent sobs broke off his words.
“No! Goddamn it! No!” Getting shot, stabbed, blown up, none of those things compared to the devastating agony that assaulted every cell of my being at the thought of her enduring that kind of degradation. My legs gave out on me, and I dropped like a stone to my knees. Never had I felt I was a weak man, but at that moment, I looked to the heavens and tears broke free. Cursing God for allowing this to happen to the tiny, sweet girl lying battered and bruised in the sea of white of the hospital bed, I broke. “Fuck you, God. You hear me? Fuck you! She didn’t deserve that! Where were you when she needed you?”
Fingers pulling at my hair, my body felt like it was coming apart at the seams. Anger and shock had my hands violently shaking. Murder swam in my veins as I wanted to destroy that piece of shit.
“Why didn’t you call me? Dammit, when she called, I was traveling down here and missed the call. Fuck, she didn’t mention how bad things were. She just left a message saying she needed my help. Like it was nothing. I was already on my way, so I didn’t think much of it when she didn’t answer my call after that. After her message, I thought maybe Javier had bad info and she was just shook and here for observation. Fuck. Is she…? Did they say she’s going to be okay?” As soon as I asked it, I knew it was a vague, ridiculous question. If anyone was a resident expert of the difference between physical survival and mental survival, me and many of my buddies could attest to the fact that you could survive a lot physically, but it was the shit in your head that would destroy you. Eat you up like a cancer.
“She called you?” His face registered surprise. Then he shook his head. “Of course she did. I told her she needed to go out of town for a while, maybe find an old friend to stay with. At least until we figured out what’s going on. It never occurred to me she would call you. I’m sorry, man, I didn’t think about calling anyone. Everything was so crazy. There was so much fucking trauma. But the doctor said… he said he expected her to make a full recovery. The swelling in her face is actually better, if you can believe that. But Kayde, you need to know… I don’t know whose, but… motherfuckin’ shit… Kayde, she was pregnant. They said maybe about three months, give or take. God, I hope it wasn’t his, but she… lost the baby.”
Before I was even rattling back the dates, I knew. This time, it had to have been mine. Barely contained fury burned in my soul, and I wanted to tear that motherfucking asshole limb from limb with my bare hands. My child. Tinkerbell and me. A baby. Our baby. That worthless fuckwad had taken that from me.
“I want to see him. You get me ten fucking minutes alone with him.” With cold eyes, I met his, and what I saw there I definitely didn’t like. “Christian?”
When he hung his head, the tightly controlled rein I held on my temper strained to the point that I could feel the very fibers of it fraying. “Christian,” I ground out between clenched teeth.
“They don’t know where he is. The last sighting was by the Mexican border. I’m still on administrative leave, and I’ve been ordered not to go vigilante. My chief is one of the few who kept faith in me and didn’t believe the shit he set me up with. Now that everything against my family came to light, and Detective Madison—Lawrence—is suspected of this and now missing, well, they are doubting the credibility of the evidence.”
“That’s why there’s a guard.” It made sense now. When I first arrived, I almost believed her brother had arranged it to keep me out. He didn’t want her out of town to help her get her mind straight—it was for her damn safety.
Dragging my emotionally drained body back to standing, I walked to the other side of her bed. Moving her like she was made of fragile spun glass, I gently lifted her hand to rest in mine. Seeing her slender, bruised hand lying in my massive palm made her appear even smaller. Squatting down and leaning over until my lips barely brushed over her soft skin, I whispered, “My Tinkerbell. God, baby, I’m so fucking sorry. How do we come back from this?”
“Kayde. We need to get her out of here. As soon as she’s cleared to travel, we need to get her somewhere safe. The doctor said she could be ready to leave by Thursday. Maybe tomorrow. Two more days tops, anyway.” Then under his breath, but I still heard him, “This wasn’t what I had in mind, and I can’t fucking believe I’m saying this…. Shit.”
After he composed himself, he looked me straight in the eye. “You need to help me. You need to take her back with you, away from here. Where you and your club can keep her safe.”
The air whooshed from my lungs. Pretty sure it took a lot for him to admit that he wanted me to help and to keep her safe. “Did she tell you I tried to get her to come back with me after she left him? When my abuela passed?” Fuck, it had been months and it still hurt to say it out loud.
“What? No! She didn’t mention a word. She said y’all connected and made up, but I didn’t know it was like that.” The shock on his face would have been funny under any other circumstances.
“Back then, she made it very clear she didn’t want to leave y’all. Don’t think she’s going to agree to that now either.”
“Yeah, well, she’s not going to get a choice now. He’s proven how dangerous he is. Kayde, he tried to burn her alive in the house when he found out he was had. Still don’t know how he found out and how he escaped. There have to be others he’s working with, so we don’t know who we can trust. I think I have a plan, but it hinges on you being willing to risk her temper.” He was a brave man. She may be small, but she be mighty, and God help the man who told her she was doing something she didn’t want to do. Especially after everything that had happened. But if it meant life or death, I was willing.
“Okay. We’ll do it. As soon as the doctor says she can be moved. What’s the plan?”
We sat there ironing out the plan for about an hour. Once we had the details straight, he stood, stretching his back. “The chair pulls out into a bed. It will probably be like a toddler bed for your big ass, but at least you’ll be close. Doc said she should sleep all night because of the pain meds they gave her. I need to go check on Dad and Ty. I’m staying at Marla’s with them, just in case. After what happened to her sitter, Em, I don’t want to risk Tyler’s mom like that.”
“What? Why the fuck didn’t any of them call me? Javier didn’t say anything about Em. Just that they wouldn’t even let him in here to see Sera. What the hell happened? Is she okay?” One more reason to kill that fucker.
“He left her for dead in the apartment with her daughter and Ty. She’s in a room on another floor with quite a concussion, but they said she should be okay. Thankfully, my sister is a smart girl. She called 911, then left the phone connected under the covers. That’s how the officers got to the apartment so fast and they knew to start looking for someone by the name of Lawrence. Of course, initially the guys who responded were from a different substation and didn’t know her or Lawrence, and they had no idea it was one of our own they were looking for. They also didn’t realize I was her brother. Not that they would have told me anything since I’m a piece of shit in the department’s eyes still.”
He paused to scrub his face with his hands. “Anyway, she kept him talking long enough for the operator to get some of the information. They pinged her cell phone, and it led them to Em’s apartment. The kiddos were still sleeping when they got there. I can’t even imagine if one of them had woken up and found Em bleeding out on the floor. He only had her for a little over twenty-four hours before it was pieced together. We were on our way to his house, but his neighbors smelled smoke and called it in, so the fire department was there first and were the ones to find her and get her out. Thank God. If she had been honest with me about the shit she endured, I might have thought to go directly to that asshole’s house. My buddy Xander was the first one in the room. He wouldn’t give me details, but he said that scene would haunt him for a long time. Shit, her friend Amy was working because they were short-staffed and she got called in. The nurses said she lost her shit. I can’t even imagine.” Furrowing his brow, he looked sick. Hell, I felt sick.
“Goddamn, Christian.” With all the shit I’d seen over the years, and I’d seen a lot of pretty gruesome shit, I didn’t want to even imagine that scene involving the woman I loved. It started to set me off again, just thinking about it.
Looking me dead in the eye, he shocked me with his words. “I can’t believe you let her go to Tyler all those years ago. You always loved her. Why did you stand by and let her marry him, then stay here even after he was gone?”
“Jesus, I wasn’t in a good place after Tyler died. She didn’t need me in her life. Then this last time? She begged me to trust her to be able to take care of herself.”
When he walked around the bed and extended his hand, I stood. Foregoing his hand, I wrapped my arms around him. “Fuck that, Christian. Regardless of how you feel about me, I miss you and I still love you, man. I’ve missed you like hell these past few years. Thank you for being here for her.”
“She’s my little sister, where else would I be? I just wish I’d known sooner. Maybe I could have prevented all of this.” He hung his head, then looked up to me with tired eyes. “And yeah, love you too, man.”
With a heavy heart, I watched him leave the room. After the door softly clicked, I returned my gaze to my little pixie.
The vision in front of me was still beautiful, even though her features were barely recognizable. She had more bandages on her body than a damn mummy. Both wrists were wrapped, as well as her upper arms. Her poor face. Thank God, they said none of her facial bones were broken. Soft tissue should heal; it would just take a while. According to Christian, the doc said she may have a few superficial scars, but most would be hidden. A visual reminder of her ordeal in the mirror every day would have made her emotional recovery even worse. I’d seen it with enough of my brothers over the years.
Pulling the chair up close to her bed, I held her hand and just talked to her. “Angel, I want you to know he won’t get away with this. I’m going to hunt him down and kill him like the animal he is. I promise you. Our baby will be avenged, and so will you. Or I’ll die trying.” Spilling all my fears and dreams, I kept talking to her, even though she slept like a princess.
After I had talked myself out, I stepped over by the window to make a few calls. Christian and I had a plan laid out, but I had some explaining to do. The one call I dreaded making was to Snow. Since I went off half-cocked and didn’t tell him what was up before I jetted out of town, he was going to be pissed that I didn’t fill him in.
“What the fuck, Joker? You just call me, leaving a message saying you’re on your way to Texas, but don’t say why? Then you go radio silent? How the fuck was I supposed to know if you were alive or dead?” Like I thought, Snow was a mad mo-fo.
“Prez, I’m sorry. My mind wasn’t right. It’s bad.” It took the better part of an hour to fill him in. By the time I finished, with a promise to keep him updated and his promise not to tell any of the brothers yet, it was almost midnight and I was about to drop.
Pulling out the little chair bed, I looked at it skeptically. Fuck it. I’d slept on worse. Scooting it over next to her bed, I reached my arm up so I could hold her hand. Taking in the damage to her battered body had my anger brewing and my heart dropping to my feet. Someone could have reached into my chest and ripped it out, as dead as I felt inside. Pushing the loss of my unborn child to the back of my head to process later, I closed my eyes. Damn, she didn’t deserve this.
With her tiny hand held in my own, my heart started beating again, just for her.